


Hallowed Earth

by elephant_eyelash



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Angst, F/M, Gift Fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-07-24
Updated: 2012-07-24
Packaged: 2017-11-10 14:23:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 789
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/467295
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/elephant_eyelash/pseuds/elephant_eyelash
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Gendry contemplates on the eve of battle.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Hallowed Earth

**Author's Note:**

  * For [comradeocean](https://archiveofourown.org/users/comradeocean/gifts).



he digs his heel into the mud, trying to get a sense of the unfamiliar earth. the ground yields to him. he presses deeper. he wonders how the earth will taste as it fills his mouth, covers over his eyes like the crooked veil of some silent sister, and how the bones, the bones will dissipate and in the end enrich the earth like compost and how all he felt like right now was meat, meat and blood and sinew and in the end that was all he was going to be.   
  
the smoke of the campfires had been stinging his eyes. but he doesn’t speak well with the other soldiers anyway. he is all grim solitude. on this night the stars seem to burn. he feels the weight of the warhammer on his hip, like some burdensome child.   
  
he thinks if this is his last night, it is an all right last night to be on this world. he isn’t hungry. he isn’t cold. this is unusual. the earth beneath him is welcoming, soft almost, like it wants to wrap him in its arms and welcome him there.   
  
/   
  
they all share apples, a token show of comradeship, on this their last night. the flesh is soft and tasteless but each man sucks it dry, imagining a thousand splendid sugared memories instead. arya watches as the peel falls to the floor. bitter smoke rises in thin, laboured movements upwards, twirling towards the bright sky. in the distance he stands, alone, silhoutted against the ocean. she walks over to him, wrapped in his dusty furs.   
  
/   
  
“it’s calm.” he says, head motioning towards the water, an expanse of nothing but black and strange, gurgling sounds, like blood rushing to the throat. she says nothing. he is used to her strange, unknowable silences. the wind rises and lifts with it the smell of salt.   
  
“arya,” he asks. “how old do you think we’ll grow?”   
  
she studies him a moment.   
  
“you want to live.” she says, the wind picking up her words and then seeming to wind it down back to the ground, letting it die quietly.   
  
“don’t you?”   
  
she sighs. “i’m not so afraid of death. i’ve seen it. i don’t know what to do with life after this. i don’t know what i want.”   
  
“i’d like to stay with you, i think, if you’ll have me.”   
  
she begins a grin. “haven’t i ‘had’ you enough times already?”   
  
his cheeks warm against the wind.   
  
“you’d be my whore?”   
  
he doesn’t reply.   
  
her teeth flash white in the darkness. she moves towards him, hips swaying, voice light as a song. “i like the idea of you as my whore, dressing you up in furs and jewels”  
  
he catches her wrist “i’m being serious”  
  
“and how do you know i’m not?”   
  
“fuck off, arya”   
  
he turns to walk away, all angry solid body, and she feels a stirring from it. she grabs his shoulder and rises up to kiss behind his ear, tastes soot and sweat.   
  
“you’re such a baby” she whispers. she kisses the route of his neck   
  
“we might die tomorrow”   
  
“i know” she says “i know”   
  
“why aren’t you afraid?”   
  
“i am. i’ve learnt to be good at hiding it.”   
  
“i’m not”   
  
“i know, i know” she whispers, fingers twining through his, this little boy.   
  
/   
  
his body refuses sleep, even after feeling her, tasting her, searching her, which usually serves as a balm, blurring the sharp edges of his senses.  but tonight everything seems sharp, ugly, too real to be real. arya sleeps. he waits for a battle that seems to have no beginning and no end.   
  
her hand gropes for his in the darkness.   
  
“sleep” she orders.   
  
“can’t”  
  
“you want me to take you in my mouth?”   
  
“no, that won’t help” he says. “what if you die and i don’t? i’ve never thought about that before.”   
  
“then you live, you carry on.”   
  
he blinks in the darkness, trying to lift the heavy sleep from his eyes. “how?”   
  
“you did it before.” she yawns.   
  
“i didn’t like it though” he says, cheeks puffing out air as he tried to remember, to remember when she was gone, but the shapes are ill-defined, lacking clarity. he remembers the smell and sound of rain, as if it was a constant of that time. she stirs next to him. they both quietly remember together, memories they are still afraid of sharing, but they fill in the silence anyway, taut and all-encompassing.   
  
sunlight begins to settle over the horizon. today is the day i die, he thinks. but she is next to him. that is enough, he decides. in death or in life, he will kiss the ground where she may walk, where she may sleep.


End file.
